


bound in shallows and in miseries

by dustofwarfare



Series: begin the end [5]
Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children
Genre: M/M, Meandering, One-Shot, supposed to be porn and ended up character study
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-26
Updated: 2018-01-26
Packaged: 2019-03-09 20:13:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13488912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dustofwarfare/pseuds/dustofwarfare
Summary: “I didn’t think of what this would look like. Burned into ash, the seas boiling.”Cloud rolls his eyes. “It’s much better this way.”“Maybe.” Sephiroth glances down at him. “I hate the things you make me feel.”Well, there it is. Cloud shrugs. “Sometimes I’m not too fond of them either. What was it you called me? The moon that controls your dark tides?”Sephiroth doesn’t answer, just stares out at the sea. “There are days they feel darker than others.”Cloud and Sephiroth spend the night in Costa Del Sol while on a delivery. There are conversations, and memories, and the stark realization that this will never be easy.





	bound in shallows and in miseries

**Author's Note:**

> This is set in the _Begin the End_ verse and started life as PWP, but then it turned into a character/relationship study because that's apparently how I roll. Anyway, I found it lingering on my docs and decided to just stop messing with it and post it as-is, though I will make up for it with some non-BTE-'verse puppet!Cloud porn very soon, promise. 
> 
> tl;dr had a hankering for the OTP and some angst. 
> 
> I will never tire of making Cloud subtly mock Sephiroth's insane and grandiose battle monologues, btw.

It takes Cloud a few beers to figure out the guy is hitting on him.

They’re on their way home from a delivery to Rocket Town. It’s the third delivery to the Western continent in as many months, and this time, Cloud brought Sephiroth and they decided to take Fenrir and cross the sea on the ferry.

But they get to Costa Del Sol too late and misses the last ferry back to Junon, so Cloud books them a room whose ocean “view” is more like a “glimpse” and leaves Sephiroth in the shower while he heads down to find something to eat. It’s early enough in the tourist season that things aren’t too crowded and only moderately over-priced, and he ends up at the outside bar, enjoying the way the warm ocean air feels in his hair.

It’s a simple pleasure, but Cloud likes those. His complicated pleasure is upstairs, probably combing out the tangles in his hair.

Cloud’s halfway through a Limit Break IPA when someone asks, “Is this seat taken?”

Cloud looks up and finds a man standing there. He’s young, dark-haired and dark-eyed, olive-skinned and dressed in casual clothes. There’s a seat on Cloud’s left that’s ostensibly for Sephiroth – though Cloud has no idea if he should save him a seat or not, it might be too crowded. Sephiroth isn’t fond of crowds. “Nope. Uh. Go ahead.”

“Thanks.” The guy sits down and rubs a hand through his hair. It immediately flops back in his eyes. “My name’s Ian.”

Cloud almost responds with _not interested,_ because old habits are hard to break and he’s not good at small talk. But instead he lifts his beer and says, “Cloud.”

“Oi. You must not be from around here, eh? Skin like that, you’ll burn for sure.”

“Uh. Not _that_ far.” He takes another drink of his beer. “Nibelheim.”  

“Nibelheim, eh? Thought there was nothin’ there but wolves.” The guy nods and flashes another grin. “Are you a wolfman?” He holds up his hands and makes them into claws, then growls.

Ian reminds Cloud strongly of Zack; the accent, the wide grin, the dark hair. “Not the last time I checked.”

“Deadpan, eh,” the man says, and chuckles. He turns and orders his own beer. Cloud thinks about leaving but doesn’t.

Normal people have normal conversations with strangers. Even introverts like Cloud. “What about you?” he asks, when Ian turns around to him again. He’s drinking a Golden Chocobo Pale Ale. Craft breweries have become a thing recently, as people scramble to make money and settle into a post-mako, post-Shinra world.

Alcohol is a popular choice for entrepreneurs. Tifa has wine at Seventh Heaven from a winery somewhere near Corel. It’s terrible, but it’s a start.

“I’m from Gongaga,” Ian answers, and there’s a small ache in Cloud’s chest because he says it exactly like Zack did long ago, on a cold mountain pass on the way to Modeoheim.

 _What? You know Gongaga?_ That laugh, that echoed off mountains. Gaia, Cloud misses him and always will.

“Cloud.”

Sephiroth’s voice cuts through the memory like a blade.

He’s changed from road-wear into a pair of clean, dark jeans and a plain navy shirt. Cloud likes Sephiroth in dark blue better than his usual black, white or gray; partly because it has nothing to do with his ShinRa-devised color scheme, but also because dark blue just looks good on him. The color is bright enough to highlight Sephiroth’s unusual eyes, and while nothing will ever bring warmth to his pale skin, it somehow makes him look more human.

“Hey.” He nods over to Ian. “This is Ian. He’s from Gongaga.”

The look Sephiroth turns on Ian is hard to decipher. Sephiroth is terrible with other people, and Cloud is never sure how much of it is awkwardness and how much of it is simple disinterest.

“Hi there,” says Ian, and he’s taken aback by Sephiroth’s eyes – most people are – but only for a second. He gives Sephiroth the same friendly smile as Cloud. “Buy you a beer, mate?”

Sephiroth has to notice the similarity between Ian’s accent and Zack’s, but nothing about him gives it away. “No thank you.” He doesn’t give his name, and Cloud doesn’t offer it. If Sephiroth wants Ian to know, he’ll tell him.

Sephiroth slides into the seat next to Cloud. His hair is back in a long braid, still damp from his shower. His bangs are drying into their usual points in the warm air. Cloud spent all day with Sephiroth behind him on the bike, and they’ve been out of each other’s presence for, at best, forty-five minutes. And he still feels dizzy catching Sephiroth’s familiar scent, feeling the slight press of his thigh against Cloud’s own.

Shiva, this is ridiculous. His awareness of this man is, as always, some kind of sick, beautiful curse.

Ian must figure out what’s up, but he’s still as friendly as ever to Cloud; asking about his trip, what brings him traveling from Kalm, why he’s _living_ in Kalm since nearly everyone lives around Edge or Neo-Midgar. The conversation isn’t continual, given Cloud is an introvert who’s spent far too much of his life suspicious around strangers, but it’s steady.

Sephiroth orders himself water and something healthy, grilled and vegetarian, and mostly ignores his surroundings in favor of staring either at the sea or the side of Cloud’s head.

He excuses himself with a polite nod, a “Cloud,” and leaves.

“So,” Ian says, after a moment. “That’s….”

Cloud doesn’t say anything. He’s never sure what people are asking him when they trail off like that. In his experience it’s best not to assume.

“Your boyfriend,” Ian finishes. “Right?”

Cloud nods. “Yeah.” It’s such a ridiculous word, and it seems almost trivial. But if there’s a word that exists to explain what Sephiroth is to him, Cloud doesn’t know what it might be.

“He’s, um.” Ian grins at him slyly. He really doesn’t look anything at all like Zack, but the comparison is still hard to shake. “Beautiful, mate. Sorry, but I don’t think there’s a better word.”

Cloud ducks his head. “Yeah.” There’s no denying that one. “He is.”

Ian’s grin turns into a leer. “You’re pretty hot yourself, you know.”

Cloud feels himself blush and isn’t sure why, other than his usual problem with compliments. He clears his throat. “Uh. Thanks.” He should maybe say something, shouldn’t he? That he thinks Ian is…what? _You kind of look like my dead best friend who I had a crush on when I was sixteen. Before I thought I was him._ This is why Cloud keeps his mouth shut.

“Wasn’t buying you that beer out of kindness, catch me?”

Cloud tenses, uncomfortable despite himself. Here he’d thought that’s what it was, but he should know by now that few people do anything just out of kindness.

“Er, I mean—wow, sorry, that’s…look, mate, I chatted you up and bought you a beer because I was hoping maybe I wouldn’t waste my ocean view alone, yeah?” Ian’s smile is kind. “But you’re with someone, so I get it. Unless…”

Great, does this guy think so little of him that he really thinks Cloud would go back to his room with him, when his – admittedly not very friendly – boyfriend is right there in the same building?

“If he’s into it, I got a king size bed.” Ian winks and takes a suggestive drink of his beer. “All I’m saying.”

Cloud almost says _I think all the beds are kings,_ before he realizes what that means. “Doesn’t matter about him. I’m not.” He realizes that sort of makes him sound like a dick. “Just in general, I’m not into it.”

“A shame, mate,” says Ian, and clinks his bottle with Cloud’s. “You change your mind, you or your pretty boyfriend, I’m in room 230.”

“Thanks,” says Cloud, and pushes away from the bar. He’s not sure why he’s saying thank you, other than seems like maybe he should. “Safe travels, Ian. Thanks for the beer.”

Ian salutes him with his bottle, then turns his attention back to bar. Cloud hopes he finds an interested party. He seems like a nice enough guy.

***

Sephiroth is lying on top of the bed when Cloud gets back to the room. The doors are open, the warm evening breeze pleasantly alleviating the stuffiness of the room. The sound of the ocean is faint but there, the surf a gentle background to the chatter and laughter of the bar patrons.

Sephiroth is reading a book he brought with him. He tends to like non-fiction, especially history. The books he reads all look boring to Cloud, who prefers magazines or schematics whenever he actually makes the time to read.

Cloud kicks his boots off when Sephiroth doesn’t bother saying anything to him, then grabs his bag and heads into the bathroom. He showers off the travel dirt and dresses in pajama pants and an old, faded Seventh Heaven t-shirt, runs a comb through his hair and fills up one of the glasses in the bathroom with water from the sink.

The tap water is terrible, but he’s had worse.

Cloud sits on the edge of the bed and drinks his water. It’s almost as flavorful as his beer, which is probably bad. “Ian wanted to have a threesome.”

Sephiroth glances up at him. “With whom?”

“Um. Us?” Cloud gives him a strange look. “Who did you think?”

“I assumed the two of you and someone else.”

Cloud stares at him. “You – you can’t be that oblivious about how you look.”

Sephiroth shrugs. “I’m aware most people find my appearance unsettling.”

Wait, what? Cloud has never, not once, heard Sephiroth express insecurity about anything. Even without his god complex, he’s never lacked for arrogance. “Is that why you left?”

“I left because I’d finished dinner, I don’t drink, and I’m not overly fond of crowds or drunk tourists.” Sephiroth blinks at him. “Was that a problem? I didn’t think you required a chaperone.”

If there is one person in the whole world Cloud knows better than he knows himself, it’s Sephiroth. And he knows Sephiroth is, for whatever reason, not telling the whole truth. He leans back on his elbows, thinking. “Something’s wrong, huh.”

“Why do you think that?” Sephiroth tilts his head.

Cloud shrugs. “I don’t know. I just know. You’re the one always going on about how we’re connected, remember? I can feel it. Are you jealous?”

“I thought you said your friend invited us both to bed,” says Sephiroth, which is not an answer.

“Yeah, I mean, it was his idea. He asked if we were into threesomes, and I said I wasn’t. But, hey. That’s your thing, right?”

Sephiroth’s eyes narrow, just a little. “Not anymore.”

“But it was.”

“That was simply…the way the relationship was, Cloud. I didn’t seek out two partners for the titillation of it.”

Cloud’s mouth quirks. That sounded almost stuffy. He and Sephiroth have fucked in every position possible and a few Cloud thinks maybe they made up. The idea that he’s being prudish about sex is absurd at this point. “The titillation of it.” He shakes his head. “The things you say.”

Sephiroth puts his book aside, but he keeps his posture relaxed – or tries. “Perhaps you would enjoy it, if you tried it.”

“You want to have a threesome with Ian?”

“Not particularly, no. Do you?”

“I already said I didn’t,” Cloud says, exasperated. Of all the conversations they’ve had, this is so…oddly normal, and yet somehow still completely insane. “He said you were beautiful.”

“People have said that before.” Sephiroth appears unmoved.

“But you don’t think so,” Cloud says, slowly, trying to untangle the knots of Sephiroth’s thoughts, which were so often barb-wired. “You think you’re…how’d you say it? Unsettling.”

“I am pale as a corpse, my hair is silver, my eyes glow and I have slit pupils like a snake,” Sephiroth says, as if Cloud doesn’t know what he looks like, hasn’t had Sephiroth’s image burned behind his eyes like a photograph that won’t fade.

“Sometimes they look more like cat eyes,” says Cloud. “Especially lately. And I didn’t think you were all that insecure about how you look.”

Sephiroth looks so affronted, it makes Cloud grin. “I am not _insecure_ , I’m simply being honest.”

As a young man, Cloud thought Sephiroth was attractive but maybe not so much for his looks as everything he represented – power, prestige, strength. It’s hard to remember that old hero worship, long ago turned to rust in the Nibelheim reactor. Cloud loves Sephiroth but it’s not the same blind adoration as his younger self felt for ShinRa’s shining soldier.

He studies Sephiroth, now, takes his time about it. Sephiroth has both his hands behind his head, the thick braid of his hair draped across one shoulder. He’s still wearing the blue shirt and jeans, but he’s barefoot, his long legs spread out in front of him. He’s tall enough that his feet hang over the sides of the bed. The muscles in his arms are defined beneath the shirt, and the position pulls the fabric tight across his chest. His stomach is flat, and Cloud knows the cut of his abdominal muscles well, has traced them with his tongue and his fingers, has fucked himself on Sephiroth’s cock and come messily on his stomach.

His face – for so long, Cloud only knew his expressions undercut by cruelty, so that he resembled his blade; cold, beautiful, sharp, deadly. It still looks like that, sometimes. Cruelty is as much a part of Sephiroth as anything else, his ego and his annoyance with Cloud’s housekeeping and his strange fondness for black-and-white monster movies.

Sephiroth tends to sneer more than smile, but he _does_ smile, though rarely. His laugh – his actual laugh, when something amuses him – is low and deep-chested, a warm rumble that always catches Cloud off-guard because he sometimes expects a blade in his chest when he hears it.

“You look like porn when you’re in the shower,” Cloud says, horrified when he hears that thought echoed out loud.

That startles one of those rare smiles from Sephiroth. “Of course _you_ would think that.”

“What?”

“You’re attracted to me,” Sephiroth says, like Cloud is an idiot. “So you’d think that. It makes sense.”  

“Yeah, but that’s…look, I’m pretty sure other people would agree with me.” Well, maybe they’d agree if they didn’t know Sephiroth or anything he’d done. Cloud sees the look he gets for that and clears his throat. “You had a fan club, for fuck’s sake.”

“Were you a member?” Sephiroth asks, smiling wickedly.

Cloud glares at him so hotly he thinks if he had his materia equipped, Sephiroth’s hair would go up in flames. “Yes. Oh, stop it. I was a kid. We were all members of your fan club.” Cloud dips his fingers in his tap water and flicks it at Sephiroth’s face.

Sephiroth scowls at him. “Mature. And I hated that, you know. The Fan Clubs. It made me uncomfortable. I was a SOLDIER. I was supposed to be a highly-trained, deadly operative – not a celebrity.”

Cloud isn’t all that surprised that Sephiroth hated his fan club, but he can’t resist adding, “A highly-trained, deadly operative who wore a leather uniform with no shirt and had hair down to his waist.”

“We’ve been over that about the shirt, Cloud,” Sephiroth says, in that insufferable _let me tell you again where the recycling goes and what we do with wet towels_ voice.  

Cloud waves a hand. “Yeah. I know. Look, I guess it just….surprises me, that’s all. That you wouldn’t think people would find you attractive. Now, I mean.”

“I didn’t say that. I said I didn’t think I was beautiful. That word isn’t at all appropriate for someone who looks so…strange, as I do. You, for instance, are far more conventionally attractive than I am. Surely _you_  know that, hmm?”

Cloud shrugs. “I guess I don’t really think about it. My hair’s weird and I’m short. People think my eyes are pretty. But that’s because I got locked in a mako tank by a madman. So.”

Cloud puts the glass on the bedside table, reaches out, and plays with the ends of Sephiroth’s hair that are gathered beneath the band securing his braid. “Did you think I was attractive when you were trying to kill me?”

Sephiroth’s smile slides easily into something closer to the sneer Cloud knows all too well. “Did _you_?”

Instead of responding with the tried-and-true _I asked you first,_ Cloud plays along. “Yeah. I told you, I always thought you were beautiful. I just thought you were a monster. The two aren’t…what do you call that? Mutually exclusive.”

“I thought very little of you, you know. Always.”

Cloud glares at him, but it’s mostly playful. Mostly. He gives a sharp tug to the end of Sephiroth’s braid. “Yeah, I know.”  

 “But I’ve always been drawn to you. That’s attraction, yes?”

“You did not think I was attractive in Nibelheim.” Cloud can say the name of the town, now, a little easier. Like his breath isn’t being trapped by some invisible weight – or perhaps it’s just that the weight is smaller, lighter, than it’s ever been. He doesn’t think it will ever really go away. “I was sixteen and weighed a hundred gil soaking wet. Three inches shorter, I think.”  

 “Our battle – our last true battle,” Sephiroth says, referring to their fight above the old ShinRa tower. “I think perhaps I noticed it, then.”

“Maybe that’s what was with the _on your knees_ comment,” says Cloud.

Sephiroth settles back on the bed. “You bring that up often. I should tell you that I think I wanted to behead you.”

It’s a testament to the weirdness of their relationship that he can say that and Cloud responds with a snort. “Like I’d ever make it that easy.”

“If I hadn’t been here, would you have gone to Ian’s room?”

“No, of course not.” Cloud frowns at him. “I go through enough mental anguish admitting I want to be with you in the first place. You think I’m gonna ruin that by, what, cheating on you?”

“No, I know you wouldn’t.” Sephiroth studies him. “I meant if I were not here, as in, if we were not together, if I were still asleep, if you’d killed me…whatever scenario you like, take your pick.”

“Are you asking if Ian was my type?” Cloud asks, smiling a little. “Maybe. But not because of how he looked, not really. Mainly because I’m leaving and going to another continent and he couldn’t find me even if he wanted to.”

“Commitment issues,” Sephiroth says, very seriously.

Cloud just raises one shoulder in a helpless sort of shrug. “Apparently not when it comes to you.”

Sephiroth smiles. He’s pleased about that, Cloud can tell. “That man did look a bit like Zack.”

“A little, yeah,” Cloud agrees. “It was the accent, mostly. You never even thought he was attractive?” This is a weird conversation, but the nice thing about being with someone you’ve killed three times is that you can ask these sorts of questions and not worry too much about it.

“I was always aware he was attractive, in a general sense. He was a prime physical specimen, intelligent enough when he paid attention, and possessed an affable nature that people found engaging.”

Cloud stares at him. He could swear the ocean waves sound like laughter. “That’s…huh. Those things are true, yeah. But that didn’t do it for you?”

Sephiroth shook his head. “I told you before. After Angeal and Genesis, sex was the least of my interests.”

“Intimacy issues,” Cloud says, nodding.

Sephiroth mimics his shoulder-shrug from earlier and says, “Apparently not when it comes to you.”

Cloud isn’t so sure he believes that – Sephiroth has plenty of issues – but all he says is, “I wasn’t trying to make you jealous. I wouldn’t do that.”

“I know you’re mine, Cloud,” Sephiroth says, turning to put his book on the table. “You’ve always been mine, hmm? The difference is, now you want to be.”

Cloud can’t really argue with that. So instead, he climbs on Sephiroth’s lap and straddles him, the end of the braid still in his hand. “Maybe you should remind me why that is.”

Sephiroth’s hand comes up and presses, briefly, against the scar hidden beneath Cloud’s shirt, next to his heart. “And this time, you won’t—”

Cloud pulls his hair hard and smacks his other hand down on Sephiroth’s mouth. “While you’re at it, get some new lines.”  

***

Cloud wakes up and it’s either very late or very early, and he knows even before he opens his eyes that he’s alone.

He gets up and pulls on a pair of pants, walks bare-chested and barefoot out of the room and down to the beach. The warm coastal air feels good on his bare skin; he’d never be able to walk around like this during the day if it was sunny. Planet’s Champion or no, his skin burns way too easy.

Sephiroth is standing at the edge of the shore, in front of a lounge chair. It’s the off-season so the beach is deserted, the moon full and high in the dark night sky.

Sephiroth looks like Shiva, all cold beauty summoned by the sea. It takes Cloud’s breath in a simple way to look at him. His hair is unbraided and he’s not wearing a shirt; between his silver hair blowing slightly in the wind and the moonlit-pale expanse of his skin, it’s like he’s a ghost.

He wasn’t a ghost, or a memory. He wasn’t an enemy, or a weapon, or a child of a calamity that sought to end all things. He was a man, a beautiful and extraordinary one, one who had done monstrous things and who looked, of all things, sad.

“I’ve been here, before.”

Of course he knows Cloud is there, that goes without question. Cloud sits on the edge of the lounge chair and simply admires him; the long lines of his back, visible beneath the shifting mass of his hair. The sharp, cruel edges of his profile. That voice, as deep as the sea.

“Me, too,” says Cloud. He remembers finding Hojo, of all people, lounging around drinking with young women, a glitter of madness in his faraway dark eyes.

He remembers, too, what Meteor looked like reflected in the crystal blue of the waves. They’d had a drink at the bar, he remembered, some unholy mix of Mideel vodka and a thousand other liquors. They called it “Fireball”. Cid had ordered one. It tasted vaguely like cinnamon.

“I was with Gen and Angeal. We had a few days leave, the three of us, which was almost unheard of. We came here, and it was…pleasant. I burned easily, which delighted Genesis, since anything that proved me to be weak delighted him. But he was the same, really. Angeal loved the water. I remember that.”

Cloud doesn’t know if he should share his memories; half-broken things full of fire and fear. But maybe the one about Hojo. That’s pretty funny. “Right after Rufus was inaugurated…do you remember when we met on the ship from Junon, or was that…her?” He’s never sure who was a clone or who was Sephiroth; he’s always thought the Sephiroth standing here, now, is the one Cloud handed the black materia to in the Northern Crater.

“I don’t know if there was really a difference at that point,” says Sephiroth. “Regardless, I remember.”

Cloud nods. “When we got here, we found Hojo. He was right over there –” Cloud points to a lounge chair a few feet away. “Drinking. In swim trunks.”

Sephiroth turns toward him in a graceful motion. “You’re joking.”

“Do I do that, ever?” Cloud shakes his head. “Yeah. He said, if I remember right, _sometimes you just have to do something like this._ I think he’d resigned.”

“I wonder where he was going,” Sephiroth muses. “Swim trunks? I can’t imagine Hojo in anything but a lab coat.”

“He was about as pasty as I am,” Cloud says. He feels a little silly, thinking Sephiroth’s odd mood had anything to do with a guy hitting on him in the bar. “That what’s bothering you?”

“Hmm.”

Cloud waits, but that’s all he gets. He stands up and walks over to Sephiroth, standing next to him. For a long moment the only sound is the rush of the waves on the sand.

“I almost destroyed this,” Sephiroth says, finally, with a wave of one hand. “Out of rage.”

“Well.” Cloud crosses his arms over his bare chest and tries not to shiver. It’s not entirely warm enough to be half-dressed like this. “And the whole alien controlling you thing.”

“And that.” Sephiroth doesn’t appear affected at all by the slight chill in the air. “It’s a pleasant memory. My time here, with Angeal and Genesis.”

“That’s good, though. I mean. You were supposed to remember the…good stuff.” Sometimes Cloud thinks about Sephiroth and Genesis and Angeal and it gives him very, very pleasant images in his head. Is that normal? Probably not. But what about this is?

“I didn’t think of what this would look like. Burned into ash, the seas boiling.”

Cloud rolls his eyes. “It’s much better this way.”

“Maybe.” Sephiroth glances down at him. “I hate the things you make me feel.”

Well, there it is. Cloud shrugs. “Sometimes I’m not too fond of them either. What was it you called me? The moon that controls your dark tides?”

Sephiroth doesn’t answer, just stares out at the sea. “There are days they feel darker than others.”

“Ah.” Cloud nods. “We should go to bed. The first ferry leaves early. Maybe I’ll let you drive.”

Sephiroth nods, but they don’t leave immediately. They stand there and watch the tides – inexorable, and thanks to Cloud, still there. It is a strange thing, being the man who saved the world and standing beside the man who tried to end it.

“Hey.” Cloud glances up at him. “I won’t let you do it, you know. Dark tide or rage or whatever, the world is going to be safe from you.”

Sephiroth nods, once, and doesn’t meet his gaze.  “I know.”

Maybe he’s angry about that, or maybe he’s relieved, Cloud can’t really tell. But he doesn’t really care, either.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Quote taken from Shakespeare's _Julius Caesar_. I think the whole quote is lovely and very Seph/Cloud: 
> 
> "There is a tide in the affairs of men, Which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune. Omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries. On such a full sea are we now afloat. And we must take the current when it serves, or lose our ventures."


End file.
